<
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/article/2024/jul/03/zadie-smith-on-hope-trepidation-and-rebirth-after-14-years-of-the-tories>
"Twenty-four years ago, when I was 24, I did my first reading in an American
bookshop. At the end, in the question-and-answer bit, a middle-aged lady with a
disgruntled look on her face put her hand up: “Yeah, I don’t get it.”
I asked her what she didn’t get.
“It just doesn’t add up. I mean, if you didn’t have any money – then how’d you
go to that fancy university?”
Now it was my turn to be confused: “Um … well, it was free.”
“Whaddya mean? Like a scholarship?”
“No. It was just free for everybody. Our taxes pay for it.”
I will never forget the gasp that went around that Barnes & Noble. So I kept
going: “And I didn’t pay for accommodation, either – we couldn’t afford it, so
Brent council gave me a full grant. Oh, and then my little brother got run over
by a truck during my first year and the NHS rebuilt his entire right hand – for
free!” More gasping. I genuinely thought some of the older members of the crowd
were about to have a heart attack, which would of course have been a pretty
expensive affair – for them.
Oh, I used to have a lot of fun with my American audiences back in the day.
Telling my quirky tales of functional healthcare and education systems free at
the point of use … But then came the moment when those stories came to feel not
just outdated, but like ancient history. Or, more specifically, like a
fairytale about a lost world, the postwar world, in which even a Tory like
Churchill saw the need for a government that supports its citizens “from the
cradle to the grave”. A world that – though very far from ever being perfected
– remains the closest my country has ever come to anything resembling social
equity.
As the years passed, I began to feel that the whole matter of the past was
becoming unmentionable, particularly in front of the young. It sounded like the
kind of generational taunting I remember despising when I had to take it from
the 60s crowd: hitchhiking in the Himalayas on a £20 budget, practising “free
love” minus the shadow of Aids, etc.
Who wants to hear this stuff? Who wants to hear about decent social housing,
free education and world-class medical care when you can’t pay the rent, the
neighbourhood school is failing and you haven’t seen a dentist for four years?
I kept my fond memories of a functioning country to myself."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
